The romantic ideal is that, when you’re in love, you become a single entity. Well, fuck that. I like to play Xbox while what she likes to do, it seems, is complain about me playing Xbox. So you see, differences of opinion. Makes a relationship stronger.
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turgiddalhlia commenting on But what do couples actually *do* in the evenings?
us women sure do like to complain. and nag. don’t forget the nagging.
Holding each other accountable also means getting used to letting each other know- in a comradely way- when commitments and obligations aren’t being fulfilled. This is a practice that must be built through an organizational culture where comradely honesty and constructive criticism replaces competitive and individualistic passive-aggressiveness or talking behind people’s backs. The flip side of giving comradely feedback is learning how to receive it, using it to help you and your organization grow and becoming more self-disciplined. This is difficult sometimes since the vast majority of the times we’re being called to task for something, it is coming from top-down relations; but the practice of holding others accountable and being held accountable is fundamental to learn, practice and promote if we want to destroy and replace these top-down relations with horizontal and egalitarian relations. And of course, ideally these practices would increase self-discipline in carrying out tasks that group members commit to. When holding each other accountable it’s important to come from a place of love and respect that avoids being patronizing, competitive, egotistical or dishonest in any way. And when being held accountable it’s similarly important to cultivate an appreciation for comradely criticism and renew our commitment to self-discipline. However, that doesn’t mean we should allow our dignity to be trampled on or ourselves to be disrespected. When criticism isn’t comradely, we should defend ourselves and demand respect as an equal even when we’ve failed to fulfill our obligations. But it is essential that comradely anarchist accountability and self-discipline as a practice needs to be developed, encouraged and cultivated within our organizations. Without self-discipline and horizontal accountability, groups revert back to dominating and oppressive top-down relations and/or involve stagnation, demoralization and ineffectiveness.
In the marriage market, numbers matter. And among African-Americans, the disparity is much worse than in Mr Harfords imaginary example. Between the ages of 20 and 29, one black man in nine is behind bars. For black women of the same age, the figure is about one in 150. For obvious reasons, convicts are excluded from the dating pool. And many women also steer clear of ex-cons, which makes a big difference when one young black man in three can expect to be locked up at some point.
Removing so many men from the marriage market has profound consequences. As incarceration rates exploded between 1970 and 2007, the proportion of US-born black women aged 30-44 who were married plunged from 62% to 33%. Why this happened is complex and furiously debated. The era of mass imprisonment began as traditional mores were already crumbling, following the sexual revolution of the 1960s and the invention of the contraceptive pill. It also coincided with greater opportunities for women in the workplace. These factors must surely have had something to do with the decline of marriage.
It seems kind of surreal that the unspoken assumption in this article is that black people must marry other black people (and i assume therefore everyone must marry other people of their ‘race’) and also that we must partner heterosexually. Good to know now, I guess.
In the halcyon days of the final economic booms, everyone on your cul de sac could have died overnight from some mysterious plague, and while you might have been sad, you wouldn’t have been inconvenienced. Our economy, unlike any that came before it, is designed to work without the input of your neighbors. Borne on cheap oil, our food arrives as if by magic from a great distance (typically, two thousand miles). If you have a credit card and an Internet connection, you can order most of what you need and have it left anonymously at your door. We’ve evolved a neighborless lifestyle; on average an American eats half as many meals with family and friends as she did fifty years ago. On average, we have half as many close friends.
— Bill McKibben, EAARTH: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet (2010). Excerpted on Alternet under the title, ” The Surprising Reason Why Americans Are So Lonely, and Why Future Prosperity Means Socializing with Your Neighbors.” [via]
Comments on Virtual friendships & false intimacy
The poor and the middle class are very different in the ways they have forsaken marriage. The poor are doing it by uncoupling parenthood from marriage, and the financially secure are doing it by blasting apart their unions if the principals aren’t having fun anymore.
— Is There Hope for the American Marriage? [via]
My feelings about marriage are very complicated. I got married (fairly) young, at least compared to most of the people I know, and feel like it has infinitely improve the stability and possibilities of both Ryan & my lives. I also think that’s possible without marriage. I am not sure if its marriage that is so beneficial, or if its the way that possibilities available make child-rearing, domesticity, etc, so much more difficult without the benefits/privileges provided to people who engage the in institution.
For the record, I still feel pretty guilty about my choice.
You’re married, not enslaved to one anothers lunacies, though actually that is often what marriage seems to be about.
— dancestoblue commenting on wedding etiquette
To expect that you can pursue a low-paying passion while someone else comes along and pays for you to live the lifestyle you desire is pretty entitled.
The time is now, yes; you’re in the prime of your life. The prime of life isn’t for wasting on booze and parties, my friend; it’s for wasting on creating and destroying and creating again, on building cities and amassing thoughtfulness, on getting something you want. Being immature sucks. And there’s no quicker way to discover that than to throw away a perfectly good relationship for the sake of some perceived right to be childish.
— koeselitz commenting on I love my girlfriend. We’ve been together for two and a half years. Should we break up?
For myself, I don’t need to date/marry a rich man; I just think that finishing college correlates with intelligence and the ability to stick with something and see it through. Plus there’s the old “we’d have more in common” (the fairly bogus excuse often used by people as to why they wouldn’t date outside their race).I think this is a more complicated issue than can possibly be addressed in 140 characters. First of all, yes, it is classist. But marriage is about a lot more than just your personal compatibility with people. Its a economic, social, cultural etc relationship. Class, race, gender, and other privilege differences are hard. They make your relationships harder, and they make the amount of work and effort to maintain those relationships harder (as if maintaining a long term relationship with another person or other people isn’t hard as it is..). Having a college education doesn’t really speak to your intelligence, your ability to work hard, or your ability to stick with something. It often points to your parent’s class status, the determination of those around you to have you stick with something, or a plethora of other things. Plenty of smart, hard working people don’t go to college. Plenty of lazy people who aren’t as smart as they think they are do. I would be tempted to say that people who don’t go to college are probably even more familiar with hard work than those who do. There’s plenty of hard work that doesn’t occur in libraries, or in cubicles.I have dated men who dropped out of school, and I have never turned down a date with someone because of his educational status. Would I rather date an unemployed guy with a Bachelor’s, or a dropout with a job? Hard to say, as long as neither one had kids.
I think that this expectation, or this desire in a partner, would be better framed in terms of actual characteristics, rather than in terms of educational achievements. There is nothing wrong with wanting a hardworking, determined, intelligent partner. There is nothing with wanting to spend time with people with whom you have things in common. What is wrong is correlating these traits with class/race/gender presentations, privileges and identities with which they have no actual correlation.
It seems that many people who listen to the kinds of music covered by sites like this surround themselves mostly with friends with similar tastes. Many of my friends listen to Akon. Regardless of what I play, they assume it’s something that will evoke images of dungeons and tight black denim.
This is just a collection of things I think are neat.
A general overview of 'things I think are neat':abandonment/the post-industrial midwest, anarchism (syndicalism, insurrectionalism, etc), race/ethnicity (esp. defining/constructing the boundaries of whiteness), gender, class (talking/thinking about class generally seems to be an underrated activity), health care (access to, the experience of obtaining, etc), art, science fiction, punk music, conservative talk radio and anthropology (which probably incorporates almost everything else about people).
![Snarky Valentines on Etsy. $12. [via]](http://30.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_kxlfotBF5R1qz9zk1o1_400.jpg)
